ZimbabweOnTheWestCoast6

Featured Zimbabwean artist Thomas Maphumo speaks on the children of Zimbabwe. Thomas Maphumo is in exile. He and his band, the "Blacks Unlimited", along with a local African American Jazz Trumpeter, Khalil Shaheed creates great "Afro Jazz Infusion". I cannot get the rhythms out of my head.
ZimbabweOnTheWestCoast 6

ZimbabweOnTheWestCoast5

Zimbabwe's Oliver Mtukudzi and his band, The Black Spirits made an appearance in Oakland, CA in 2006. I had a golden opportunity to speak with him and some of his band members. Here's what they had to say.

Episode 4

Featuring the music of Dominion Accapella, under the direction of Valerie Brown; and the KTO Project, a Zimbabwean/American band founded by Kelly Takumba Orphan (former student of the University of Zimbabwe).

More scenes of my Beloved Binga Rural Community and Lake Kariba and Ntengwe's own.
PlanetaryLiberation No. 4

Episode 3

Ntengwe's children of Binga continue to sing their hearts out to the world in an attempt to share their feelings as we journey beyond the middle passage (the journey on slave ships from Africa to America) to present time...living and performing and remembering the dreams of those ancestors that survived the passage. We are all living the ancestors' dreams...as Composer, Jacquline Hairston and other well known musicians and performers share theirs.


Planetary Liberation No. 3

PlanetaryLiberation No.2

The host of Echoes of Africa and I continue our radio interview on Ntengwe for Community Development in Zimbabwe. The episode features more photos of the elephants and nature scenes of Zimbabwe, as well as scenes from everyday life of the people. Ntengwe youth meet at their home office for meetings. This is where I stayed during the time of my 2004 visit to Binga, Zimbabwe. Also shown are photos from the opening ceremony for their new "Drop-In Center" which opened it's doors during 2006. The "Drop-In Center" was designed and donated by the Japanese Embassy. I saw the final blue print (2004)at while I was there, before it was actually built. The center provides a place for the children to come and have breakfast before school, in the mornings and do homework after school and have more meals.(when there's food in Binga) Some of the children are seen clad in new clothing and tennis shoes donated from Europe for the ceremony in honor of the opening of the Ntengwe Drop-In Center.

At a service at the East Bay Church of Religious Science in Oakland, CA, I managed to capture footage taken during a service that empowers children and communities.

ZimbabweOnTheWestCoast6

Zimbabwe on the West Coast

Featured Zimbabwean artist Thomas Maphumo speaks on the children of Zimbabwe. Thomas Maphumo is in exile. He and his band, the "Blacks Unlimited", along with a local African American Jazz Trumpeter, Khalil Shaheed creates great "Afro Jazz Infusion". I cannot get the rhythms out of my head.
ZimbabweOnTheWestCoast 6

Planetary Liberation Episode 1

This first Episode explains how it all began for me. A visit to Ntengwe for Community Development in Binga, Zimbabwe. Ntengwe is a not for profit organization which targets youth, orphans and vulnerable children, and women infected and affected by HIV and AIDS. Founded by my Sisteren, Elizabeth Markham who spent many years growing up in Africa. Many of her ideas and goals were conceived here in the Bay Area as a dream to empower the children of the Tonga and Shona Tribes of Zimbabwe.

This first episode introduces the children and their music from the CD, “Tuli Bamuchaala – We are The Orphans”. The creative process began with participatory research of over 500 children and the formation of a 200-voice children’s choir. The children composed their own songs, ten of which are featured on the CD. The children sing about AIDS and how it is taking the people they love away from them. World renowned Zimbabwean musician, Oliver Mtukudzi came on board in January 2003, when he traveled to Binga district to produce and contribute his much loved vocals to the recording of the CD.

I am proud to introduce the music of these beautiful african children. Their CD was first aired in the US in the summer of 2005 on Radio Station KKUP, in San Jose, CA.
Planetary Liberation No. 1